One of the primary advances that the “Information Age” has brought has been an increase in the number of options that people have for communicating with one another. Examples of these new avenues for communication include email, streaming audio and video, and instant messaging (IM). These new forms of communication enable people to be more productive, as well as enhance their everyday lives.
One type of electronic communication that has become increasingly popular is IM. IM uses a program called an IM client to send a message to another person. A user of IM may have a list, called a contact list or buddy list, of people with whom the user wishes to communicate. This contact list often contains some indication of whether or not a particular person on the list is currently online, that is, whether a device belonging to the person on the list is currently running his/her IM client. When the IM user sends a message to a person, the IM client typically opens a window that allows the user and the contact to view messages that are typed by either party. IM communications are not limited to two people, but rather, a number of people may utilize an IM connection, often called a chat group or chat room, to communicate simultaneously. In addition, IM may be used for sharing links to web pages, images, sounds, and files and for streaming content, such as text, audio and video.
One advantage of an IM communication is that it allows immediate interactive communication between two or more people. That is, the participants in an IM conversation are virtually linked and, as such, are able to send and receive data concurrently over the IM link. This allows for immediate feedback as well as a greater feeling of being connected with the others in the IM conversation.
However, the connectedness that is one of the greatest strengths of IM brings with it some serious shortfalls. First, an IM client will only communicate with another IM client when the first IM client is running. When the IM client is not running, any messages sent to the IM client will simply not be delivered or, in the alternative, an error message will be generated. Furthermore, if the user of an IM client leaves the IM client running while the user is busy or away from his/her terminal, any messages sent to the IM client will remain unanswered. This could be frustrating to senders of the messages, especially if the senders can determine from their IM clients that the IM client of the intended recipient is running. Such users may assume that the intended recipient does not want to talk to them and is ignoring them.
In view of the foregoing there exists a need for a tool that overcomes the above-referenced deficiencies.